Creating Together

Project Idea: Every Story Starts Somewhere, Fandom: Arrow

Title:Every Story Starts SomewhereAuthor:OiasoFandom: ArrowRating: T/Teen and Up AudiencesWarnings: "No Archive Warnings Apply" is mentioned on AO3, but I would um, mention that there is a situation with a gun and someone getting hurt, blood, etc... So that'd be the only warning I'd mention for the fic.Word Count: It's 49,885 words, according to AO3, which I think doesn't count the long author's notes (which we would be skipping reading - I asked Oiaso and she agreed that we should skip the author's notes). So yes, it'd be a long project to take on. It's 29 chapters total.Summary: Felicity had gone to the bank alone, but when the waiting took much longer than expected, Oliver decided to go over there to keep her company. They couldn’t imagine he would end up fighting for his life, nor predict how close they’d grow after their visit to the bank. Every story starts somewhere.

I would like to clarify that this is a pro-Olicity shipper fic (het), I was the beta for this entire fic, and so I've read the fic multiple times in the process. I'm attached to the story and would adore the chance to turn it into a podfic, with the help of some of you. It'd be my first ever team podfic with multiple voices. The fic has 561 kudos on AO3 and 695 people have followed it on FanFiction.net, to give you some gist of how loved it is.

The fic varies POVs and so sometimes 3 chapters all take place at the same time, just one chapter is inside one part of the bank, another chapter is outside the bank, etc. Because of this, to establish a shift in location but that it's at the same time as another thing that happened, sometimes a few lines end up being repeated and I think for the sake of the podfic we should use the exact same recording any time this "repeated line" thing comes up.

Performance Description: a Dramatic Reading performance.

My Role in the Project: I would be willing to take any one of the speaking roles. And I am happy to be in charge and lead this project and keep us all on schedule and stuff, even though I've never done this kind of thing before. I think it could be a lot of fun, and worthwhile because Arrow is a popular fandom but there aren't that many podfics out there in the fandom.

Who will Edit: I would be up for the challenge of editing the entire podfic. ;) You can totally leave that to me.

About the Voices Needed: 6 podficcer voices would be ideal. And of course any accent is fine, don't worry, we want you. ;)Additional Information:

It's a complete fic with 29 chapters. There will be a sequel written, but I'm only planning on us podficcing this first of the 2 fics.

I think it should be a fic where preferably 6 people work together, each taking on a different role. Well, everyone's voice will be used to play multiple characters, except for the Narrator's, but each person will play one main character throughout the fic. Except for Person F, because that podficcer is getting both Thea and original character Henry. So Person F will be playing two main characters thoughout the fic. (All of the chapters with Henry speaking are before Thea comes into the fic, then once Thea's in the fic Henry's gone, and I made Thea and Henry the same Podfic Reader, so all-in-all I think it'll work out fine.)

There are times when within the same one chapter you will be playing two different characters (because I need you to play a news reporter at the beginning of the chapter AND a nurse at the end of it, or something). Ideally, you will act slightly differently during each of those two characters' lines, if possible. I tried to avoid that happening whenever possible, though. Usually, you only have one character to play per chapter.

And I tried my best to make the amount of speaking that each person does throughout the podfic as fair as possible.

Person A - reserved for I'mcalledZorro now; we talked on FanFiction.net) narrator (Person A only speaks for the narration, but ends up with the most to say throughout the whole fic, and is the only person needed in every single chapter.)

Person B - reserved now for mrz1289, see the comments below) Oliver + also the minor character of the "cashier woman" in chapters 2, 4 and 12 (with a line from ch4 also repeated at the start of ch6), + the police department's IT specialist (Emma) in chapters 5, and 8, + nurse in chapters 20 & 21, + James the TV news reporter in chapter 22. (Person B plays 5 different characters total, but mainly Oliver. There are significant lines for some of these other characters too, though. Oliver doesn't speak in quite a few of the fic's chapters, so I ended up assigning Person B to play alternate roles in a lot of those chapters.)

Person C - reserved for actressen now; we talked on FanFiction.net) Felicity + the young mother in chapter 11 (Samantha "Sam"), + paramedic #1 in chapter 19. (Person C is mainly Felicity, but does play 3 different characters total throughout the fic.)

Person D - reserved for me, luvtheheaven, now, since all of the other parts might be taken) Diggle + Mike (the younger of the two bank robber brothers) + the young boy bank hostage in chapter 10, + Mary the TV news reporter in chapter 22, + the surgeon in chapter 22, + the nurse in chapter 24. (Person D plays 6 different characters total, but mainly Diggle and Mike, who are in many chapters and serve important roles throughout the fic.)

Person F - tentatively reserved for mitzijani, see the comments below) Thea (starting chapter 21) + Henry (the older of the two bank robber brothers) throughout chapters 2-18, + chapter 3's female bank hostage (same line is repeated to start chapter 4, and we could use the same recording), Smith (the head of hostage negotiations who first appears in chapter 5), + the one line of the waitress's in chapter 29. (Person F plays 5 different characters throughout the fic, but mainly Henry and Thea, who are pretty huge characters. Smith, also, has a lot of lines.)

I expect it will take a few months before we can finish recording/editing/creating this, but I am really excited to make this happen. I really hope I can find 5 other podficcers who know Arrow to be interested in doing this with me.

If you have any questions for me, let me know. Hopefully this idea catches on and we can actually bring this to fruition. I'd really love for a podfic to be made of this fic.

Hey, so if you (mrz1289) want to get started early on your little test reading thing so that I can screen you and make sure you'll be able to be a part of the podfic, send an email to me at pemk7@aol.com and I'll send you the relevant thing. I'll ask you to perform one short section of Oliver speaking. You will be asked to edit out mistakes and also edit out any extra parts you read - any other characters or any narration. You will be asked to follow the rules for recording here: http://collaborativepodfic.dreamwidth.org/680.html#cutid4 if at all possible. If you need help I'll see what I can do. And there's no need to rush, I still don't even have a 5th person lined up for this podfic... just... I figured I might as well start screening everybody now. So please, send me an email as soon as you can, and then I'll send you what I want you to read for me as the test. ;)

Thanks! I just heard from someone from New Zealand on FanFiction.net who is interested too. Unless you are that person? If you're a third, different person (you, previous commenter, and FFN person make 3) then with you on board, we only need 2 more people. I wasn't really planning on screening people via auditions. I thought I'd just take the first 5 people who showed interested at all, and I'd be the 6th person.

Awesome. Yeah, you're probably right. I think for now I'm just gonna risk it. So is there a role out of A, C, D, and F that you want most? Maybe after all of the roles are cast, I can double check quickly with brief audition things if everyone will work okay for the part.

Hey, so if you (mitzijani) want to get started early on your little test reading thing so that I can screen you and make sure you'll be able to be a part of the podfic, send an email to me at pemk7@aol.com and I'll send you the relevant thing. I'll ask you to perform two short sections, one of Henry speaking and another of Thea. You will be asked to edit out mistakes and also edit out any extra parts you read - any other characters or any narration. You will be asked to follow the rules for recording here: http://collaborativepodfic.dreamwidth.org/680.html#cutid4 if at all possible. If you need help I'll see what I can do. And there's no need to rush, I still don't even have a 5th person lined up for this podfic... just... I figured I might as well start screening everybody now. So please, send me an email as soon as you can, and then I'll send you what I want you to read for me as the test. ;)

Okay so we need 1 more person and then we'll be done finding people. Only one, I'm pretty sure. This is exciting. We'll get the last person soon, I'm sure we will.

I'm working out test-reading scripts now. Something pretty brief, from the fic, for you all to test read for me, just as a temporary thing. I will also need you all to edit your audio files to be only your part, and to delete any extra reading you do of narration or other characters' voices. This will be part of the screening process - testing you all to see if you can do this for me. ;)

We have already started creating the podfic together. Chapter 1 is almost complete and we're starting on chapter 2 now. Just FYI. I hope we can keep this post up here though, because my color coding is useful, at least for myself. :P I don't want to lose this text in the post above that I wrote. It helps me plan out the fic.